A hybrid relaying protocol for the parallel-relay network

Author

Summerson, Samantha Rose

Date

2010

Advisor

Aazhang, Behnaam

Degree

Master of Science

Abstract

Cooperation among radios in wireless networks has been shown to improve communication in several aspects. We analyze a wireless network which employs multiple parallel relay transceivers to assist in communication between a single source-destination pair, demonstrating that gains are achieved when a random subset of relays is selected. We derive threshold values for the received signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) at the relays based on outage probabilities; these thresholds essentially determine the active subset of relays in each time frame for our parallel relay network; due the random nature of wireless channels, this active subset is a random. Two established forwarding protocols for the relays, Amplify-and-Forward and Decode-and-Forward, are combined to create a hybrid relaying protocol which is analyzed in conjunction with both regenerative coding and distributed space-time coding at the relays. Finally, the allocation of power resources to minimize the end-to-end probability of outage is considered.